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Column: What GOP Talks About When There's Nothing To Say

This story was written by James M. Larkin, Harvard Crimson


Dick?Dicky? You awake?

Ah, here.

Alright, thatd seem to be everyone down to business. The wheels are coming off the wagon, boys. Our man Mac looks more and more like a hack: Hes changing his mind every three days, andhis running mate, though a looker comes across as a littlelight in the skills department, and the pair of them have looked spent for coupla weeks now.

Hit em!

Whats that, Karl?

Knockout punch. Has that blowhard Biden ever been seen with an infant not his own non-white, preferably?

Come on, Turd Blossom, that trick only works once a decade. Voters are getting sick and tired; hell, its starting to look like theres such thing as too mean. And hey, not to sass back here, but since when did mistrust of everything aint white become a party plank for us?

Probably about the same time trillion-dollar deficit spending and torture did. Let me ask you: When has the miscegenation card not worked? Bang that drum: Have you seen these crowds Sarahs been drawing? Talk about fired up.

Listen, lynch-mob fired-up is not the same as Rock-the-Vote fired-up. It kind of looks, to me, like were tapping a nasty vein here. We used to be about NASCAR dads, not crypto-Klansmen. What happened to compassionate conservatism, values voters?

Umthat was campaign-trail hogwash, Hoss. Hate to burst your bubble. Maybe you havent noticed, but weve never really been the go-to guys for compassion or prudence, or honesty, or the human touch. Ours is the big tent of Joe Lieberman and Alberto Gonzales. Youre right, though; Gramps isnt pulling it off. No use being a wolf in a temperamental and frustrated old mans clothing. Horseshit doesnt work without a healthy dose of charm.

For the record, I feel compassionate; that oughta count for something. Anyway, consider our bluff called. Even the old drones are turning tail: Brooksy, Lil Kristol, Chris Buckley and Newt Gingrich are so busy renouncing McBane on Fox News that our folks cant get any airtime. Dick, you got any plans for reuniting the gang?

Well, I was creeping around the old CIA storehouse like always, looking for wiretap microphones. (My office ran out, and I suspect the pool guy at the Wyoming house has been inviting Soviet apparatchiks over to parties when Im away.) At any rate, I found a few leftover exploding cigars might be time to have a little reunion at the Capital GrilleShow em what treason means. [Laughs with quiet menace.]

You mean the ones for Castro? Were talking about our biggest fans, the cheerleaders who stayed bubbly when 70 percent of Americans wanted our heads. Were not talking about Castro.

Arent we?

You should get some rest, Dick. Im the decider: Were not gonna syruptishsurteptishsurseptitiously explode members of The National Review editorial board. Talk about shooting your friend in the face. What happened to our principles and talkin to the group of folks across the aisle? Sometimes I feel like weve been coasting along for a decade or more by selling folksy, hawkish nonsense next to bumbling and alienating liberal senators.

[Silence.]

You guys are right; no way. Dont know why I even had the thought. Anyway, now we gotta right the ship: no more lying, no more threatening and no more baby insinuations. Were better than that.

Cmon, boss, one last try: Im getting good with Photoshop after that Iraq stuff. We could maybe throw together a birth certificate that says Bill Ayers fathered John McCains black baby with Michelle Obama. Hows that for a silver bullet?

[Looks at Dick, who narrows his eyes vaguely.] Um, yeah. You got my green light on that one, boygenius. Let me know how it turns out; Ill be in my room playing Club Penguin.

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